The aviation industry hangs its hat on air travel being "the safest
way to travel."

The truth, however, is that it has harbored a dark
secret since its inception:

it's poisoning its passengers and crew
due to deeply flawed aircraft design, de-prioritizing safety in
favor of profit.

In flight, every crew member and passenger relies on an air supply.

The assumption, of course, is that this air is filtered if not fresh.
Perhaps you have sensed (and promptly dismissed) that there may be
quality control issues around cabin air.

The problem goes further
than that, however, and astoundingly, this is not by accident but
by
design.

What's more concerning is the fact that the industry has known about
this completely preventable health hazard for at least 40 years, but
no attempts have been made to filter this cocktail of hundreds of
chemicals (including
organophosphates in the same category as toxic
nerve agents like
Sarin) out of the cabin air before travelers are
forced to breath them in.

Nor has the root cause of the problem - unsafe aircraft design and the deprioritization of human safety
- been effectively addressed.

A history of cabin air supply
Essentially, the problem comes from the need to supply the jet
airliners with warm compressed air while flying at high altitudes.

In order to do so, all planes used by commercial airlines since 1963
inject the cabin with air directly from the compressors of their jet
engines in what is known as 'bleed air.'

In the 50's, engineers
designed airplanes which pulled fresh air into the cabin, but this
"modification" was deemed too costly by decision-makers at the time.

As a result of poor design, every breath that the crew and
passengers take today, consists of a 50/50 mix of recirculated cabin
air and bleed air, the latter of which can contains a wide range of
synthetic chemicals, such as
tricresyl phosphate (TCP or TOCP), an
organophosphate which is highly neurotoxic to humans.

In fact, the
World Health Organization stated in 1990 that,

"Because of
considerable variation among individuals in sensitivity to TOCP, it
is not possible to establish a safe level of exposure" and "TOCP are
therefore considered major hazards to human health." 1

And so, with the exception of single
aircraft - the new Boeing
787, where cabin air is taken directly from the
atmosphere with electrically powered compressors - all flights today
involve a high risk of exposure to these neurotoxic chemicals.

When you consider there are about
100,000 flights a day (only 5% of which occur on "safe" Boeing
787's, with at least 1 in 100 flights experiencing a major 'fume
event,' this amounts to the health endangerment of millions of daily
passengers.

Entire advocacy organizations exist
which are dedicated to exposing the truth about the dangers of toxic
airplane air, and pressuring the industry to initiate reform.

"Bleed air comes from the compressor
section of the jet engine, which has to be lubricated. Jet
engines mostly have "wet seals" to keep the oil and air apart,
which cannot be 100% effective.

Furthermore these seals, like any
mechanical component, slowly wear out and their effectiveness
gradually declines. This wear can occur more rapidly when the
engine is working hard, such as climbing under full throttle.

They may also fail suddenly and will
then let a significant amount of oil into the very hot
compressed bleed air, resulting in fumes and/or smoke entering
the cabin. This is known as a 'fume event'.

There are no filters in the bleed air supply to stop this
happening.

Note that the oil used to lubricate
jet engines is not based on petroleum hydrocarbons, as are
lubricants for internal combustion engines used in motor cars,
outboard motors, tractors etc.

Jet engines operate at much higher
temperatures and, therefore, use special synthetic chemicals as
oil. They also contain organophosphate additives as antiwear
agents and other aromatic hydrocarbons as antioxidants.

Some of the oil gets partially
decomposed, i.e. chemically altered ('pyrolysed') due to the
high temperatures in the engine."

Watch the teaser for the new documentary
Unflitered Breathed In - The Truth about Aerotoxic Syndrome:

A complex toxicological
assault

Since at least 1977, with the first
documented case of a C-130 Hercules navigator becoming incapacitated
after breathing contaminated cabin air, the aviation industry's
secret has remained hidden...

One thing that has worked in their favor
is the common belief that the fatigue, malaise, and similar
complaints experienced after a flight are caused by "jet lag";
presumably solely a byproduct of 'disrupted circadian rhythms,'
(medically referred to as desynchronosis) and not the 800lb gorilla
of neurotoxic organophosphate exposures sitting next to every
passenger on each flight.

This is not to say alterations in bodily
rhythms and other 'natural' factors like cosmic radiation,
dehydration, and the fact that the cabin is pressurized at between
6,000-8,000 feet (which keeps oxygen levels dangerously low), do not
play a significant role. They certainly do.

But the problem is that the chemical
exposures are rarely if ever identified as a problem.

When you also figure in the routine use
of pesticides in planes, and the subsequent "toxic soup" of
hydrocarbons and synthetic chemicals created, the toxicological
synergy amplifies the exposure problem far beyond what would be
expected if one focuses only on one chemical.

One can only imagine the cumulative role
these exposures have had on the notoriously poor health of airline
crew, as well.

Clearly, there are highly practical
justifications for the industry "cover-up," as the legal liability
for the damage already done to the health and well-being of aircrew
alone would be astronomical.

Clearly, if these symptoms are indeed
caused by exposure to "bleed air," or exaggerated 'fume events,'
these chemicals have the ability to cause profound damage to the
human body, particularly the nervous and immune systems.

A 40-Year Long Cover Up
Now Exposed

Considering aircraft pilots are
continually exposed to jet engine chemicals that can even be found in
their blood, the industry lacks any reasonable justification for
continuing to ignore the problem.

Compromising the neurological fitness of pilots should be taken as
seriously as a mechanical defect in the plane.Pilots,
after all, are essential to keeping the plane safely in the air.

And significant exposures are not a rare
occurrence.

A 2007 report by the UK Committee on
Toxicity of Chemicals in Food
Consumer Products and the Environment (COT), accepts that fume
events occur on 1 flight in 100.

The Aerotoxic Association offers a
qualification of this statistic, indicating the problem is likely
even worse:

"However, on some aircraft types
crews report that they experience fumes to some degree on every
flight and as the definition of "fume event" is not agreed upon,
it makes it impossible to give a true figure."

Under-reporting is epidemic, due to the
fact that modern jet aircraft have no chemical sensors installed,
and only visible smoke is officially reported in the flight log.

Technically, the noses of aircrew are
the only detectors being used, and background levels of
contamination may not be detectable by smell at all. Likely the most
toxic of the hundreds of chemicals present in the bleed air, the
organophosphate TCOP, in fact, is odorless.

It's a sad fact, but a U.S. Attorney Alisa Brodkowitz and
aerotoxic syndrome expert once correctly opined:

"...the only thing filtering this toxic soup out of the cabin
are the lungs of the passenger and crew."

60-minutes obtained an internal memo
from the Boeing aircraft company dated 2007 (watch minute 13:00 of
the '60 minutes' episode below). It's all about toxic air.

Excerpts from the report written by a
frustrated senior Boeing inspector reveal a well recognized problem
within the company:

"Some of the events have been significant, in that the crew
reported blue smoke with defined waves in smoke."

"Who knows what the by-products are in hot synthetic turbine
oil? The data sheet has warnings about breathing the fumes."

'60 minutes' describes the most startling
passage, which,

"ends on a chilling note. That lives need to be lost
before Boeing will act.":

Not surprisingly, Boeing does not
feature the "clean air" design of these planes in its marketing
copy.

Bringing attention to this feature would
also bring attention to the widespread problem, which all of its
other aircraft participate in. Despite this, advocacy organizations
have publicly congratulated Boeing on its decision to create a
non-toxic alternative.

The development and existence of the
Boeing 787 represents a tacit acknowledgment of the industry wide
problem discussed in this article, and is a wonderful step towards a
permanent solution.

But the vast majority of planes are still in the
technological dark ages, with awareness of the extent of the problem
and danger only starting to trickle into consciousness.

It will be consumers and
non-governmental advocacy organizations that will force the industry
and its regulators to make this issue a priority.

If only one airline in this country made
the step of addressing the problem, it would see huge support by an
increasingly educated consumer base (that's you and who you share
this article with!)

Short of redesigning existing aircraft,
the following solutions, offered by the
Aerotoxic Association, could
also be implemented:

As bleed air is not presently
filtered, installation of bleed air filtration systems would
eliminate the problem, although a technically efficient
system does not yet seem to have been developed.

A less toxic oil formulation
could lead to significant improvement. The French oil
company NYCO is continuously developing such oils.

Chemical sensors to detect
contaminated air in the bleed air supplies - instead of
human noses - would alert pilots to problems, allowing
prompt preventive action.

As discussed in the conclusion of the
seminal paper on aerotoxic syndrome referenced above, the aviation
industry is reluctant to acknowledge the problem and reform:

"It has become apparent that the
primary safety consideration of the airlines is to keep
airplanes flying - the safety of workers appears to have a very
low priority to operational safety.

Further, the regulatory agency
involved in aviation safety (the Civil Aviation Safety
Authority) admitted in evidence to the Senate Aviation Inquiry
that its area of responsibility is airplane safety, not
occupational health and safety.

Monitoring studies conducted by
aircraft manufacturers and the airlines have failed to detect
any major contaminants, although to date most monitoring studies
have used inappropriate sampling techniques (such as air
collection of poorly volatile contaminants) or inadequate
methodologies (such as sample collection time, sample volume,
storage of samples, not taking account of altitude).

No monitoring has been conducted
during a leak incident

Attempts by airlines to address this
problem through design, maintenance and operational improvements
and through staff support and medical care have not been
successful, and in the main, continue to be reactive and
piecemeal.

Obviously, in some cases, options
such as improving engine design are not within the sphere of
activity of the operators. The efficacy of recent modifications
to the aircraft remains unknown, and leaks are still occurring,
albeit at a reduced rate.

An admission was grudgingly made by
one airline in 1998 that adverse exposures had been occurring,
and that such exposures might cause irritation and transient
effects.

However, the development of long
term symptoms is vigorously denied.

Civil aviation regulations clearly
state that,

'the ventilation system must be
designed to provide a sufficient amount of uncontaminated
air to enable the crew members to perform their duties
without undue discomfort or fatigue and to provide
reasonable passenger comfort.'

The admission that irritation and
transient symptoms can occur demonstrates non-compliance with
the above rules.

Further, the adversarial and
acrimonious manner in which some airlines have pursued workers
compensation cases brought by staff with aerotoxic syndrome
indicates a confrontational approach which is unlikely to be
beneficial to all parties in the long term."

The good news is the internet,
social media, and consumer-driven platforms like ours have
demonstrated how we can all engage the system to change the world.

First, watch below the new documentary
on aerotoxic syndrome: Unfiltered
Breathed In - The Truth about Aerotoxic Syndrome.

Second, if you are a Facebook
user, join the
group Angel Fleet, which has almost 9,000 members
discussing the problem, and working on solutions together.

Third, get yourself a mask with
the capability to greatly mitigate exposures in the case of
a leak or "fume event." This is a relatively affordable one
with a charcoal filter that we are
presently investigating directly from the Aerotoxic
Association website (not
an affiliate link). They will ship to the United States; you
can calculate the cost when you put it in your basket.

(Note: we have not yet the
opportunity to extensively evaluate the different masks on the
market, but will be following up with a research report once we get
further information. This will also include strategies to mitigate
toxicity).